English for Research: Usage, Style, and Grammar

Book excerpt: This guide is based on a study of referees' reports and letters from journal editors on the reasons why papers written by non-native researchers are rejected due to problems with English usage, style and grammar. It draws on English-related errors from around 5000 papers written by non-native authors, 500 abstracts by PhD students, and over 1000 hours of teaching researchers how to write and present research papers. English for Research: Usage, Style, and Grammar covers those areas of English usage that typically cause researchers difficulty: articles (a/an, the), uncountable nouns, tenses (e.g., simple present, simple past, present perfect), modal verbs, active vs. passive form, relative clauses, infinitive vs. -ing form, the genitive, noun strings, link words (e.g., moreover, in addition), quantifiers (e.g., each vs. every), word order, prepositions, acronyms, abbreviations, numbers and measurements, punctuation, and spelling. Due to its focus on the specific errors that repeatedly appear in papers written by non-native authors, this manual is an ideal study guide for use in universities and research institutes. The book is cross-referenced with the following titles: • English for Academic Research: Grammar Exercises • English for Academic Research: Vocabulary Exercises • English for Academic Research: Writing Exercises • English for Writing Research Papers Adrian Wallwork is the author of more than 30 English Language Teaching (ELT) and English for Academic Purposes (EAP) textbooks. He has trained several thousand PhD students and researchers from 40 countries to prepare and give presentations. Since 1984 he has been revising research manuscripts through his own proofreading and editing service.